EV drivers urged to preheat batteries amid cold weather (aka winter)

Not the latest model

EV owners might want to consider the risks of putting a heat source near a lithium battery. If that goes wrong, it can really go wrong. But if they don’t or can’t preheat their battery in cold conditions, e.g. it’s parked in the street, they can look forward to a significant range reduction, made worse by using the car heater.
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In the wake of the coldest night of the winter in the UK, Edmund King, President of the AA, has issued guidance to electric vehicle (EV) owners, emphasising the importance of preheating their cars and charging overnight, reports Energy Live News.

As the nation grapples with snow and ice that led to the closure of numerous schools, Mr King warns that colder temperatures can adversely affect EV batteries, leading to longer charging times and reduced efficiency.

The AA noted that electric cars may experience a reduction in range ranging from 10% to 20% in colder temperatures.

This is attributed to the diminished efficiency of the lithium-ion battery, exacerbated by drivers activating features like heating.

This advice comes as electric vehicle users in the US, particularly in Chicago, have faced difficulties due to freezing temperatures, with reports of Tesla owners abandoning their vehicles.

Full report here.

Electric double-decker bus erupts into flames in Wimbledon during rush hour

London hybrid double-decker [image credit: buses world news]

Scary. Best wear running shoes when using vehicles powered wholly or partly by lithium batteries (full details not yet reported). — Update: the bus manufacturer is Switch.
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A bus has dramatically caught fire on Wimbledon high street this morning, with residents reporting a loud bang and thick smoke.

Videos and photos showed clouds of smoke billowing from a red double-decker bus on Wimbledon Hill Road and Alwyne Road. ‘We heard a huge bang. We were terrified’ Max Pashley, a local resident, told City AM.

There have been no reported injuries, according to the Met, while road closures and cordons are expected to remain in place for some time. “We thank the local community for their patience and cooperation as emergency services work at the scene,” a spokesperson said.

‘Hydrogen village’ plan in Redcar abandoned after local opposition

Eco house with hydrogen heating technology. [Image credit: emergingrisks.co.uk]

People power 1, ‘net zero’ 0. Government attempts to browbeat the public into accepting even a trial based on its flaky climate obsessions prove fruitless, on this occasion at least. As for the ‘insufficient local hydrogen production’ excuse: who would want to produce large amounts of hydrogen on spec and then hope to find a buyer nearby?
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A plan to test the use of hydrogen to heat homes in a village in the north-east of England has been abandoned after months of strong opposition from concerned residents, reports The Guardian.

The government said the Redcar “hydrogen village” scheme, which had been expected to start in 2025, would not go ahead because of insufficient local hydrogen production for the trial to replace the home gas supplies with the low-carbon alternative.

The decision ends months of protest against the scheme locals feared could raise energy bills and prove unsafe.

Rishi’s Empty ‘Net Zero’ Rhetoric – NZW

Photosynthesis [image credit: Nefronus @ Wikipedia]

Net Zero Watch summarises: ‘Rishi Sunak’s recent speeches on Net Zero are long on rhetoric, but the decarbonisation juggernaut rumbles on uninterrupted.’ — Pursuing climate obsession at a slightly slower rate still doesn’t work. Carbon dioxide isn’t a pollutant.
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Over in the Spectator, Fraser Nelson is inviting us to welcome a change in Rishi Sunak’s tone on Net Zero, says Andrew Montford @ NZW.

His interest has been piqued by the PM’s speech at COP28, which he says shows that Sunak has “started the difficulty work of moving the UK climate agenda from fantasy to policy”.

There will be no more precautionary-principle daftness, we are told, and attention is drawn to the Prime Minister’s claim that from now on decarbonisation will be pursued “in a more pragmatic way, which doesn’t burden working people”.

Nelson is quite correct that the whole drive for Net Zero is a fantasy. It is the triumph of political posturing and bureaucratic trickery over rational decisionmaking.

The big chill: flights suspended at Glasgow Airport – as warnings for snow and ice in place across UK

One day into meteorological winter and already global warming has gone missing. As ‘cold health alerts’ are activated, renewable energy has all but dried up leaving gas to take the strain of electricity generation. Even coal is outperforming wind power.
Update: Flights resume at Glasgow Airport [announced at 1020 am].
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Weather warnings for snow and ice are in place across swathes of the UK as temperatures plummeted below freezing overnight, reports Sky.com.

Forecasters have warned the wintry conditions could affect some road and rail journeys with icy surfaces posing the risk of injury from slips and falls.

Glasgow Airport has suspended flights due to heavy snow, with passengers urged to check with their airline for updates.

Alberta Strikes Back at the Federal Government’s Energy Transition Plan

Image credit: mining.com

Alberta is the main player in Canada’s shale oil and gas industry. The outcome of this power struggle over climate ideology and its claimed consequences will be, let’s say, interesting.
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Alberta’s Premier has invoked a controversial piece of legislation to protect its citizens from the federal government’s Clean Electricity Regulation, reports OilPrice.com.

This is the first time the Sovereignty Act has been invoked in Alberta. The move involved Premier Smith tabling a resolution at the Alberta legislature that instructed provincial agencies such as the Alberta Electric System Operator to ignore the Clean Electricity Regulations when they came into effect, “to the extent legally permissible,” CBC reported.

The Sovereignty Act was enacted last year and its purpose was exactly the purpose it was used this week by the government: to protect the province from federal laws that the provincial government considers unconstitutional.

Government has surrendered to green lobbyists – NZW

UK governments snookered themselves by passing the Climate Change Act. Now when the green lobby says ‘jump!’ all they can do is say ‘how high?’ They’ve given themselves no other option.
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Net Zero Watch says Claire Coutinho’s decision to award huge price increases to renewables operators is a wholesale surrender to green lobbyists.

— Generators awarded large and open-ended price increases to new offshore wind, with a minimum 66% increase.
— Government has offered further handouts contingent on delivery of a ‘low carbon supply chain’ and ‘social benefits’
— This can only increase costs to consumers, who should expect hefty increases in bills

Campaign group Net Zero Watch has ridiculed energy minister Claire Coutinho’s claim that handing a 66% price increase to windfarm operators is part of her plan for ‘bringing bills down for families’.

UK sued for counting wood burning with carbon capture as ‘negative emissions’

Biomass on the move [image credit: Drax]

Denounced by one opponent as ‘an accounting gimmick’ and ‘double counting’. The whole biomass from trees industry is once more outed as little more than a giant subsidy-grabbing confidence trick, from energy-intensive conversion of wood into pellets all the way to so-called carbon capture. Where are the real world benefits in this hugely expensive system?
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Environmental groups are taking the UK government to court on Monday (13 November) over plans to spend billions on Biomass with Carbon Capture and Storage (BECCS), a technology aimed at removing CO2 from the atmosphere that is also being promoted by the European Union, says Euractiv.

Plaintiffs say BECCS technology relies on flawed accounting assumptions because it sees the carbon captured from wood burning as negative emissions when the process is at best neutral from a climate perspective.

“The government’s rationale for BECCS as providing negative emissions violates international carbon accounting protocols underpinning the Paris Agreement, to which the UK is a signatory,” said a statement from The Lifescape Project and the Partnership for Policy Integrity (PPI), two environmental groups that are the complainants in the case.

“Burning forest biomass and relying on BECCS for negative emissions will not contribute to the government’s legal obligation to achieve net zero by 2050,” they warned.

US Watchdog Has Grim Winter Warning: There May Be Blackouts

If it’s climate obsession versus reality in US power supplies, there can only be one winner. Strong opposition to new gas pipelines plus increasing reliance on intermittent renewables can only end badly for consumers of power.
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As much as two-thirds of the United States could experience blackouts in peak winter weather this and next year, the North American Reliability Corp has warned.

These warnings have become something of a routine for the regulatory agency lately, says OilPrice.com.

Earlier this year, NERC issued a blackout warning for some parts of the U.S. over the summer, citing extreme temperatures.

Germany To Bail Out Siemens’ Struggling Wind Turbine Division

Big Wind to governments: ‘We’re gonna need a bigger trough’. So much for cheap renewable energy, a stale myth if ever there was one, given the endless subsidies. How much is too much in climate obsession circles? Net zero targets have created a captive market for suppliers.
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The German government is preparing to provide financial support to Siemens Energy’s struggling wind turbine division amid a broader crisis in the wind and solar industries, reports OilPrice.com.

-> Siemens Energy, facing significant losses, is in talks for up to 15 billion euros in guarantees, with the German state covering 80% of the initial funding.
-> Siemens AG shares have plummeted over 70% since mid-June, with the company abandoning its 2023 profit outlook due to challenges in its wind turbine unit.
-> The UK government is set to offer higher subsidies for offshore wind projects, following a previous auction where developers backed out due to low pricing, indicating growing financial strains in the renewable energy sector.

How wind turbines are blinding the RAF’s vital North Sea radars

Hornsea Offshore Wind Project, Yorkshire, England
[image credit: nsenergybusiness.com]

Is the Government scoring a major own goal in pursuit of its fantasy climate goals? Hoped-for ‘energy security’ from wind power is looking further away than ever.
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Britain’s race to net zero risks blinding crucial radars protecting the UK from incursions over the North Sea amid fears that Russia will launch a campaign of sabotage.

Offshore wind farms blades interfere with radar signals and there are concerns that plans for a significant expansion of turbines in the North Sea by the end of the decade will cause problems for the Royal Air Force (RAF).

The Ministry of Defence has spent £18m over the past three years trying to stop wind farm blades from scrambling radar readings, the Telegraph can reveal.

However, none of this public spending has, so far, yielded a concrete solution to the problem.

Energy “transition” to be much more expensive

The cost deceptions of wind power lobbyists can’t be maintained any longer, as the UK government has closed off their favourite loophole. As this Net Zero Watch press release headlines it: ‘Wind industry confirms Great Green Lie’.
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Campaign group Net Zero Watch says that the wind industry has effectively admitted that it has been deceiving the British public over the cost of the energy “transition”.

RWE Renewables has just told the Government that it needs its subsidy “strike price” to rise by 70% if any more wind farms are to be built.

Net Zero Watch director Andrew Montford said:

Rishi Sunak has said that there has been a long-term deception of the British public. RWE’s demand for more subsidy confirms it. The Green Blob has been lying about renewables costs for years. The truth is that wind power is expensive, and becoming more so. The energy “transition” is a transition to poverty, but few in Westminster seem to have the guts to say so.”

Full press release here.

Fossil fuels are back: Shell takes axe to its ‘Low Carbon’ division

High demand for a profitable product is a winning formula for commercial success and oil companies aren’t going to be slow to cash in on current prices, no matter what climate obsessives or politicians may say or think. Hydrogen-related roles get squeezed due to slack market interest. Meanwhile renewables firms seek ever larger handouts.
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Shell has taken another axe to its once lofty decarbonization plans, as the U.K. oil giant’s pivot back to fossil fuels picks up steam, says Climate Change Dispatch.

The group plans to cut at least 15% of staff working in its ‘low-carbon solutions division’ [sic] while scaling back its hydrogen business, Reuters first reported Wednesday.

The move will see 200 jobs go in 2024, with another 130 placed under review by the company, according to a statement from Shell.

The division specializes in solutions to decarbonize the transport and industry sector but is separate from its renewables business.

Britain ‘will need gas to avoid blackouts for decades’

The story here refers to Britain’s ‘gas addiction’, but a renewables addiction will be far more problematic. At present gas power stations are being made ever more uneconomic by government net zero policies, but low wind days and hours are a given. Energy intensive carbon capture plans will only make matters worse.
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The man running Britain’s gas network has said the country will need fossil fuels to prevent blackouts for decades to come despite calls for the Government to begin shutting off the pipes. — The Telegraph reporting.

Jon Butterworth, chief executive of National Gas, said a growing reliance on intermittent power sources such as wind and solar meant Britain would be increasingly reliant on gas to make up for shortfalls when renewable energy sources are not generating power.

Mr Butterworth said: “In 2022, the wind didn’t blow enough or at all for 262 days. And in those 262 days, we would have had rolling blackouts, or a full blackout across the UK if it wasn’t for gas.”

Powering AI could use as much electricity as a small country

Image credit: technologyhill.com

The definition of a ‘small’ country could change to ‘not so small’ quite quickly. When so-called net zero climate policies are threatening to make electricity supplies more restricted and unreliable, the added effect of AI demand could become significant. This is on top of the issue with data centres – the BBC recently reported that Data centres use almost a fifth of Irish electricity.
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Artificial intelligence (AI) comes with promises of helping coders code faster, drivers drive safer, and making daily tasks less time-consuming, says TechXplore.

But in a commentary published October 10 in the journal Joule, the founder of Digiconomist demonstrates that the tool, when adopted widely, could have a large energy footprint, which in the future may exceed the power demands of some countries.

“Looking at the growing demand for AI service, it’s very likely that energy consumption related to AI will significantly increase in the coming years,” says author Alex de Vries, a Ph.D. candidate at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam.

Energy leaflet: ‘Preparing for a power cut’

The UK electricity network is clearly not what it used to be. Can it be any coincidence that as coal power disappears thanks to ‘net zero’ type climate obsessions, leaflets like this start arriving on the domestic mat like this one today?

SP Energy (aka Scottish Power) covers parts of southern Scotland, North West England and North Wales. If other energy providers are doing the same type of leafletting or similar (emails etc.), let us know.

One section is about ‘Storms and Severe Weather’ but the one about ‘Preparing you for extreme events’ gets to the heart of the matter: ‘the possible but unlikely scenario of an energy shortage due to the current energy landscape’. They can’t even bring themselves to say electricity (see leaflet title)!

The Nuclear Microreactor Race Is Heating Up

Image credit: turbosquid.com

The supposed climate/emissions angle is useful to the makers, although the article points out that ‘some experts and activists contend that the world can radically scale back hydrocarbons without using more nuclear power’. Of course not being intermittent and weather dependent is a selling point for electricity generation devices these days, for example in EV charging away from home.
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During a wide-ranging interview with The Epoch Times, the leadership of Nano Nuclear Energy Inc. predicted they would win the race to commercialize a reactor small enough to fit in a shipping container, says ZeroHedge (via OilPrice.com).

“By 2030, we’re pretty convinced we’ll be the first company to sell microreactors,” said Nano Nuclear CEO James Walker, a nuclear physicist who previously led the development of the Rolls-Royce Nuclear Chemical Plant.

Nuclear microreactors are meant to be nimble, mobile sources of heat or up to 20 megawatts of electricity.

NSW fireghters foil fire risk at smoking green energy unit

Credit: mgathermal.com

Storing electricity, e.g. from renewables, is an ongoing headache with a recurring problem. If things go wrong ‘hazardous materials crews’ may be needed, along with a ‘bulk carbon dioxide tanker’ to cool things down – spot the irony. The company’s aim of ‘Making 24/7 renewables a reality’ is looking a tad optimistic.
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Firefighters have called in expert technicians to help deal with a dangerous heat build-up at a cutting-edge renewable energy storage plant but the incident has been stabilised, reports The New Daily.

MGA Thermal is behind a new form of thermal energy storage that allows retrofitted coal-fired power stations to distribute renewable energy long after it was produced.

But the company had to call in firefighters on Friday morning at its demonstrator plant in the Tomago industrial area, north of Newcastle.

Initial assessments of over-heating machinery led to the evacuation of 15 businesses.

To study atmosphere, NASA rockets will fly into October eclipse’s shadow

Annular eclipse [image credit: Smrgeog @ Wikipedia]

This is part 1 – part 2 is next April.
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A NASA sounding rocket mission will launch three rockets during the 2023 annular eclipse in October to study how the sudden drop in sunlight affects our upper atmosphere, says Phys.org.

On Oct. 14, 2023, viewers of an annular solar eclipse in the Americas will experience the sun dimming to 10% its normal brightness, leaving only a bright “ring of fire” of sunlight as the moon eclipses the sun.

Those in the vicinity of the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico, however, might also notice sudden bright streaks across the sky: trails of scientific rockets, hurtling toward the eclipse’s shadow.

A NASA sounding rocket mission will launch three rockets to study how the sudden drop in sunlight affects our upper atmosphere.

Six companies chosen for UK nuclear tech contest

SMR transporter

There’s a yawning gap of a decade or so between the end of UK coal-fired power stations in late 2024 and the hoped-for arrival of its potential replacement, new SMR nuclear power.
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Six companies have been selected to advance in the Small Modular Reactor (SMR) competition, reports Energy Live News.

Among the chosen contenders are industry giants like EDF, Rolls Royce and GE-Hitachi Nuclear Energy International LLC.

The SMR competition aligns with the government’s strategic plan to revitalise nuclear power.

The government’s ambition is to have up to a quarter of all UK electricity generated from nuclear power by 2050.